Helmuth Hartmeyer (Austrian Development Agency, University of Vienna)
From Practice to an Approach towards Learning
Reviewing where development and global education has come from: its traditions, practices, approaches, challenges
I. History
In the early 1990s Klaus Seitz
1 analysed the development of Global Learning in
Austria in the framework of a larger investigation into the history of Development
Education. He observed four eras of Development Education in the course of the then thirty-year-old history of the working area:
The Cold War Era
The early 1970s
The early 1980s
The late 1980s
The Cold War Era
In the era of the Cold War, the Third World was primarily seen as a problem (see
S EITZ 1993a). Development Education and awareness-raising were peripheral. For the aid agencies, which were mainly organisations of the Catholic Church, advertising for donations was foremost. Images of misery in fundraising meant an appeal to charity. Martin Jäggle and Bernd Sibitz confirm this in their comprehensive analysis and documentation of “Awareness-Raising of the Third World in Austria”, in which they investigated the information work of 43 development organisations in the 1970s.
For 29 of the surveyed organisations awareness-raising fulfilled the purpose of advertising in order to acquire money and to recruit staff through appeals for donations. Only 10 wanted to raise consciousness (see J ÄGGLE / S IBITZ 1975).
The early 1970s
1
The research was a project of the German Research Society, undertaken together with Annette
Scheunpflug from 1990 to 1992.
1

At the beginning of the 1970s there was a clear break. Next to the institutions founded in the 1960s
2 the newly established Third World Action Groups and
Solidarity Committees confronted the public with discomforting messages. They were quickly established as an independent, committed voice and they had a marked influence on Austrian development policy.
3
They questioned development strategies which were solely directed at economic growth. In particular those groups motivated by Christianity pleaded for an alternative life style in their own society. In 1975 the first fair trade organisation was founded. It supported the establishment of a tight and professional network of world shops - shops devoted to fairer trade.
Within the universities the first structured courses in the field were developed for students. The Austrian Students Union established a desk for development issues.
After a survey among students the decision was taken to offer for the first time - a seminar “Introduction to the problems of developing countries”. The idea was to create a transdisciplinary instrument for the further establishment of offers concerning development in teaching and research.
At that time the reform of the educational system - the catchwords were: clearing out the curriculum, university reform, expansion and modernisation of the education system - was regarded as the leverage for societal reform. The content “Third World” was understood to go hand in hand with an alternative, counter-hegemonic pedagogy. “Education euphoria and curriculum reform also fascinated Development
Education” (S EITZ 1992a, p.18).
4
However, in public awareness-raising, advertising for donations still prevailed. Efforts focused on the formation of a critical consciousness were at their beginning (see J ÄGGLE / S IBITZ 1975). The information given was mainly about development aid projects, and only rarely contained information about developing countries, hardly ever about development policy (see
S EITZ 1993a, p.7).
In Austria we can speak about a defined concept and clear institutional support for continuous Development Education and public awareness-raising only since the mid
2
Among these were the Vienna Institute for Development Issues (1962), the Institute for International
Co-operation (1963), the Austrian Youth Council for Development Aid (1965) and the Austrian
Development Service (1968).
3
E.g. the export of Austrian tanks to Chile was prevented.
4
My very first task as education officer at ÖIE in 1982 was the development of an ideal-typical model of a curriculum.
2

1970s (S EITZ 1993a, p.25). In 1978 at the Austrian Youth Council for Development
Aid a desk for Development Education was created. The foundation of the Austrian
Information Service on Development Policy (ÖIE) in 1979 contributed to a considerable expansion of provision and to the structural establishment of this working area and to a more precise occupation with the question of which groups should be targeted through the work.
The early 1980s
Since the end of the 1970s the dominant cognitive acquisition of information was replaced by a concern for participative methodologies. Affective, playful and actionoriented learning came to prevail. Everyday life was discovered as a subject of
Development Education. There was a broad consensus to move from a pure transfer of information, which Freire called the “banking method”, to an understanding of education as a critical process, which includes creative elements (interview with
J ÄGGLE , 21 April 2005). Through exploration of issues in people’s own environment, such as alternative life styles or actions of solidarity in one’s own neighbourhood, alliances with the peace and environment movements were made possible. Criticism of the Austrian arms export policy or of trade in pesticides, or discussions about imports of tropical wood - these debates contained potential for political conflict.
These debates also led to disagreements about the content and perspectives of information and educational work.
5
The late 1980s
The fourth era was the phase when in the mid 1980s the Third World was begun to be seen through the perspective of deficits, and as a factor of global instability, but also begun to be understood in terms of its cultural wealth. Issues of intercultural communication moved into the centre after a first wave of migration. The dominant pedagogy for foreigners, which aimed at the assimilation of the children of migrants, was critically questioned. The direct empathic comprehension of the situation of the immigrants should be made possible. In adult education, in particular, African drumming or Asian cooking came to be highly valued.
5
The Austrian Court of Audit, which had been mandated with a politically-motivated control examination of ÖIE by the Minister of Foreign Affairs criticised the orientation at development policy instead of solely development co-operation in ÖIE publications.
3

Towards the end of the period of his investigation, Klaus Seitz locates a remarkable qualitative expansion of content in Development Education during the late 1980s and early 1990s. “The interfaces between the issues of international justice, the multiculturality of a society, of the global environment problems, the question of peace and the limits of growth all emerge within Development Education and replace an isolated treatment of the Third World or of development aid. The rediscovered term “One World” and the pleas for “global learning” are the definition of this expansion of the context” (S EITZ 1992a, p.19). With this analysis Seitz contributed to the reinforcement of the term into the debate.
In an article in Südwind Magazine Klaus Seitz gave the first comprehensive description of the development of the didactical conceptions of Global Learning in an
Austrian publication (see S EITZ 1992a and 1992b). In “One World Pedagogy and
Education“ he points out that the term “One World“, which became fashionable in the
1990s, goes back in its roots to the 1940s
6 and that the didactical principles for education in the horizon of “One World” also have a history of many decades.
7
Klaus
Seitz sees the guiding lines developed in the 1960s in their core as still valid in the
1990s. They can be found in almost all concepts of Global Learning projects.
8
Global Education in Austria – we prefer the term Global Learning - has developed out of 7 conceptual roots:
Political Education – marked by an Educational Principle from 1978, which opened teaching in the classroom for issues of democracy and human rights. This included
Third World issues.
6
In 1943 the US-American politician Wendell Wilkie had published a book titled “One World“. In it he designed the programme of a peace-creating universal union of nations under the omen of a hegemonic Pax Americana (see S EITZ 1992a, p.11).
7
In a book from 1962 (“The developing countries in classroom-teaching”), which he edited, Wolfgang
Hug - in the follow-up of an international seminar at the UNESCO-Institute for Pedagogy in Hamburg was the first to describe the baselines of a “Third World Pedagogy” (see S EITZ ibd.).
8
“One World“: With “One World” as the horizon, into which all content in education has to be placed.
Global interdependence in “One World“ becomes the central content of learning and the competency to act responsibly in an interconnected world is the central objective of education.
Intercultural Learning: The acknowledgement of the cultural plurality of world society is accompanied by attempts at learning from other cultures while not underestimating the various culture-bound contexts of perception.
Overcoming Eurocentric charity thinking: This refers to the perception of people and peoples overseas as subjects, e.g. by moving away from teaching about catastrophes, which turns people in the Third
World into objects of charity.
Development Education as a principle in education: Instead of a solely quantitative expansion of the canon of education through new subject matter, a global perspective should be integrated in all forms of education. (S EITZ 1992 A , p.26)
4

Development Education – mainly promoted by NGOs which took advantage of the opening of the system in the 1980s in order to establish Third World issues in the formal school system.
Peace Education – promoted by a very active Peace Movement in he 1980s, which was less active in the 1990s, but has gained new importance since the recent wars in the Near and Middle East.
Environmental Education – which developed out of the controversy between the aim of protecting the environment on the one hand and changes in the behaviour and of politics on the other. The UNCED 1992 in Rio added the global dimension.
Intercultural Learning – which saw the interesting development from a pedagogy for immigrants to inter- and transcultural learning.
Human Rights Education – gaining importance through the UN-Decade of Human
Rights (1995 – 2004).
Ecumenical and Interreligious Learning – which for a long time had no connection to Global Education, but realises the new challenges esp. in urban areas due to immigration of Islamic citizens.
II. Roots of Global Learning in Austria
I will now outline more of the tributary contributions from these pedagogical fields.
Political Education: Cosmopolitanism and understanding of the existential problems of human kind
The situation in one of the school reference subjects became important for the conceptual development of Global Learning and its expansion. The conceptual possibilities of Political Education were defined in an educational policy decree
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, which became important for the implementation of Development Education at school.
9
In the Austrian school-system an educational decree is both a political and an educational statement of school administration (usually promulgated by the MoE) to point out important directions within framewok curricula.
5

The decree ‘ Political Education at Schools’ from 1978 was an important milestone in the history of the Austrian school system. It followed a 30-year-old decree on Civic
Education and was distributed to all teachers. In the decree Political Education was defined as a transdisciplinary teaching principle which has “at its core the concern for a democratically founded consciousness about Austria, for pan-European thinking and for a cosmopolitanism which is carried through an understanding of the existential problems of mankind“ (M O E 1978, section I, p.2). “Political Education should promote the ability and readiness to stand up for inviolable basic values like freedom and human dignity; to reduce prejudices and to stand up for the causes of the disadvantaged; it should lead to the understanding that achieving a just peace order is necessary for the survival of mankind; it should create a clear consciousness that achieving these objectives requires the worldwide commitment of all powers and has to be seen as the personal obligation of each individual being” (M O E 1978, section II, p.4).
As for the relevance of the decree Karl Leyrer drew the conclusion that its impact would mean that teachers would no longer be allowed to evade “the problematic area of underdevelopment and dependence” (see L EYRER 1980, p.6).
10
In order to motivate and qualify teachers, the ministry established a nationwide further training course on Political Education, in which international and development questions were also made an issue. Some extracurricular organisations also offered qualification trainings.
In adult education, no adequate conceptual foundation could be laid, because Austria only spends 0.1% of its educational budget on adult education.
11
Only the political education carried out by political parties is regulated by law (see G ÖTTEL 2005). The
European Year of Political Education in 2005 was too short-handed an initiative to provide much further impetus.
Development Education: Provision of Information and Services for Schools on “Third
World and Development Policy“
10
The MoE presented a new draft for debate in autumn 2006. Among other issues the growing complexity in all areas of life and the concern for an explicit understanding of the global problems of mankind are mentioned. The draft is still under inspection.
11
In Finland the comparative figure is 13% (see G ÖTTEL 2005, p.12).
6

The decree Political Education could also gain importance because the organisations dealing with Development Education used the new possibilities it offered and because development information was positioned upfront in schools.
The Ministries of Education and Art as well as of Science and Research published a comprehensive supplement of the Pedagogical Information, in which the offers of information and services for schools about “Third World and Development Policy” were made widely known.
12
ÖIE became the centre and pivotal point of Development
Education in Austria in the 1980s and was also the organisation for which I worked from 1982 – 1993. ÖIE was probably the first organisation which arrived at the understanding that Development Education should be based less on a top-down transfer of information, and more on the needs of the learners. Its purpose, according to Martin Jäggle, was “to give room to communication with the issue in a nonschooling way” (interview with J ÄGGLE , 21 April 2005). With its explicit regional structure ÖIE acquired modelic status
13
, and was also internationally recognised.
Through its successor organisations, it offers to this day the basis for an all-round advisory service, providing materials and projects for all multipliers interested in
Development Education and Global Learning.
Influenced by Paulo Freire
14 and based on concrete experiences in educational work, the 1980s brought about the end of the “banking method”, which was based - as stated above - on the transfer of information and was characterised by the conviction that it would be enough to transfer knowledge from one person to the other. Martin
Jäggle describes this approach with a pointed remark: “I know something, others should reproduce and follow it” (interview with J ÄGGLE , 21 April 2005). Education was increasingly understood as a critical process, which included creative elements.
15
The educational work of ÖIE met with great demands from the 1980s onwards. The growth rates of the advisory and other services were high.
12
See: MoE (ed.): Pedagogical Informations (Vienna, 1984/4): Provision of information and services for schools about “Third World and Development Policy”. The authors were Heinz Gabler,
Helmuth Hartmeyer and Christa Renoldner. (44 pages).
13
ÖIE had established regional offices in all nine provinces (Laender).
14
A Paulo Freire Centre was founded in Vienna in 2004.
15
See ‘ Decree on Holistic-Creative Education at Schools’ (M O E 1990).
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To testify to the positive changes in the area of schools in the 1980s, the longstanding educational officer at ÖIE, Christa Renoldner, suggests that the following results were accomplished:
The issue “Third World” was better anchored in the curricula.
The number of Eurocentric texts had decreased.
In many schools classroom projects about issues of development policy took place during the last weeks of the school-year.
The offer of teaching materials which were good in their methods and content had increased.
(S EITZ 1993a, p.20)
Environment Education: Responsibility between challenge and excessive demand
In the field of Environment Education, the 1980s were shaped in the whole Germanspeaking discourse by the confrontation between the protagonists of Environment
Education and those of eco-pedagogy (interview with L EUTHOLD , 21 August 2006).
The German term for Environment Education can be found in texts since the early
1960s (R AUCH 2005, p.19). It came from the Anglo-Saxon discourse. By its own understanding, Environment Education is a political instrument for the long-term solution to existing environmental problems. In the 1980s, however, it was predominantly directed at the national, and often at the local context. By all means it wanted to be more than classroom teaching about environment protection. It was about:
sensitising people to the whole environment issue
transferring a basic understanding of the most important ecological problems with their many biological, socio-economic and cultural connotations
responsibility initiating empathy and developing ethical values directed at ecological responsibility
transferring skills and the ability to exercise them
motivating and encouraging direct socio-political participation.
(see R AUCH 2005, p.20)
8

The concept of Environment Education mainly referred to school. It would flow into the curricula as a guiding principle and serve the purpose of renewing the didactics of natural sciences.
The eco-pedagogy of the 1980s took up a critical position towards Environment
Education (see R AUCH 2005, p.21). It regarded the ecological crisis not only as an excrescence of industrial ways of production and ways of life, but saw it also founded in human patterns of thinking and acting. An eco-pedagogical approach should also be characterised by an educational stance that included a denial of the dominant technical-economic approach. Otherwise, people would become executive organs of economic growth and of a belief in consumption through education. Ecopedagogy advocated alternative technologies and manageable life environments. In its understanding of education it propagated a “learning which distinguishes itself through openness to experiences, the further development of social relationships, networking with other systems, and which works within self-organising groups“
(R AUCH 2005, pp.22-23). It was a holistic concept, which aimed to include all sectors, and therefore the belief was that it could not be implemented in one system, the school system, alone. It functioned in the political context of emancipatory movements in civil society.
For both strands - in eco-pedagogy as well as in Environment Education - the discussion, initiated by the World Conference on Environment and Development in
Rio de Janeiro in 1992, evoked a response which meant a considerable challenge and also an excessive demand. The discourse about global sustainability at the beginning of the 1990s meant a paradigmatic shift, not only for Development
Education, but also for Environment Education. This paradigm shift raised questions to which Global Learning could give possible answers (see L IESCHKE 1992).
Peace Education: Guiding principle of a worldwide, just development
In his “Pedagogy of the Other” Werner Wintersteiner gives a survey of the time after the Second World War. He makes a rough distinction between three phases. The first phase involved approaches which started with personal peacefulness and the ability of people to resolve conflicts. The second phase involved the critical Peace
Education in the 1960s and 1970s with the claim for political will. Wintersteiner identifies the third phase beginning after the end of the East-West conflict and with
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the start of the present globalisation. According to Wintersteiner this third phase is characterised by the “retreat of the political” in both societal prestige and academic discourse. This phenomenon contributes to the limitation of the relevance of, and public attention to, Peace Education (see W INTERSTEINER 1999a, p.33).
The climate of the Cold War in general, but also Austrian arms exports to authoritarian states and dictatorships in the Third World in particular
16
, led in the
1980s to the many activities of a diverse and lively peace movement in Austria. It meant at the same time that the issues of war and peace also played a relevant role in pedagogical practice. Many teacher training seminars and project days at schools took place, which dealt with issues of arms and development.
17
In the 1990s, environmental problems, intercultural issues and questions of human rights pushed the peace issue as a central content of Global Learning into the background. Since the beginning of the new millennium, however, and in particular since 9/11 and the events that followed, Peace Education is once again playing a bigger role, not least through the developments and events in the Near and Middle
East.Today the vision of a global just development is more topical than ever.
Intercultural Learning: References to the multiculturality of the world society
While in the 1960s and 1970s the term Intercultural Learning was mainly used in the context of migration, immigration and refugees (using the catchphrase: pedagogy for foreigners), it only became established in Development Education in the area of school and adult education in the 1980s (see F RANZ 1997).
16
17
18
In 1987 the MoE informed all principals of secondary high schools and vocational high schools that the ministry, together with AFS
18
, had produced teaching material for project teaching in Intercultural Learning. The essential motivation for such education is the need for an educational response to the rapid increase of intercultural contacts in tourism, world trade and through the media. Additionally, there are cross-cultural contacts in one’s own country, which can be enriching, but can also cause conflicts. In a first decree, Intercultural Learning is regarded as a tool for conflict resolution and the cross-fertilisation of cultures. The learning objectives in
Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, Morocco (see Ö IE 1982).
The ÖIE had produced a tool kit “Development instead of Armament”.
AFS is an international exchange programme for Intercultural Learning.
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the document show a close connection with aims that are later found in Global
Learning. Among these are:
The recognition of one’s own culture as an essential precondition for intercultural learning
The need for greater acceptance and tolerance of other cultures; the recognition of prejudices and stereotypes
Reflection on the relevance of religion, language, economic factors, etc in intercultural contacts
The reduction of fear of the unknown and the unfamiliar.
(M O E: Decree Intercultural Learning, 1987)
Regarding pedagogy, project teaching is regarded as the best method. It can better promote a climate of understanding and openness. Dissolving the structures in classrooms, establishing working teams, co-operating with extracurricular institutions, organising events (with national dishes, dances and music) are part of the recommendations, which were meant to support successful Intercultural Learning. In its outline the decree takes into account the understanding, which found acknowledgement in Austria in the 1980s, that in addition to the promotion of intellectual understanding, the emotional domain should be essential in learning processes. Process-oriented and self-organised learning methods are regarded as particularly effective at transferring insight regarding the interconnections of complex structures and to motivating people to independent action. As the decree states:
“Learning how people of different cultures interact with each other is only possible through experience” (M O E 1987).
A second decree about Intercultural Learning, promulgated in 1991, was directed at primary and lower secondary schools as well. It took into account that the number of children of non German-speaking origin had increased considerably, especially among this age-group.
19
Furthermore, due to the depth of the explanation of the subject matter, the decree mirrored the debate which had taken place since the mid
1980s. Intercultural Learning is called a form of social learning, in which the cultural aspect plays an important role. The decree from 1987 is based on the observation
19
In 2005 their percentage in primary schools was 40% in Vienna, 17% in Salzburg, 7% in the
Tyrol. (Der Standard, 12 November 2005, p.3).
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that Austrian pupils mainly have contact with the “there” . Contrary to that, the decree from 1991 refers to the multicultural situation in many Austrian schools and therefore deals more with the “here” . And while in 1987 the emphasis was on information and the methodical transfer in project teaching, the decree from 1991 emphasises more the relevance of one’s own experience and reflection as a pre-condition for the reduction of prejudices. The formulation of a vision is: “The expansion of borders in the inside of people is also a true basis for the dissolution of borders between peoples and nations, as we hope for it” (M O E 1991). Another difference to 1987 is that Intercultural Learning is also recognised as an issue for foreign-born children.
Proponents of Intercultural Learning critique the tendency in Development Education to reduce the Third World to issues of economics and power struggles. People are mainly presented as victims and as being in need. This, it is argued, leads to rejection instead of empathy. The Third World should be a partner in dialogue, not an object. This, however, seems only possible by reducing and finally overcoming eurocentrism (see B UCHAUER 2003, p.14). Martin Jäggle points to the risk that the attempt to be very friendly to foreigners can be excessively demanding. It can lead to both the suppression and creation of feelings of guilt, to masking fear or promoting it
(see J ÄGGLE 1995, p.13). He acknowledges the opportunity to learn through our encounters with other people we do not know and to gain knowledge about ourselves through cultural ambivalence.
For Klaus Seitz, it makes little sense “to limit an educational concept about the dimension of ‘otherness’ and unknown cultures to a specific subject matter, which would justify its own didactics. On the contrary, Intercultural Learning points at the multiculturalism of world society”(S EITZ 1993b, p.66). Seitz pleads for overcoming the didactical separation into subjects which are far away and those which are closer, and for moving towards a multicultural unity based on a non-dualistic viewpoint.
Anti-racist education is a special aspect of intercultural and multicultural learning - but also of Human Rights Education.
Ecumenical and Interreligious Learning: Empowerment for Dialogue
Development Education was without connection with religion in Austria for a long time (interview with J ÄGGLE , 21 April 2005). In this a fruitful element was missing,
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compared to other German-speaking countries, with the Ecumenical Movement (see
S EITZ 2003b, A SBRAND / S CHEUNPFLUG 2005b). The Catholic organisations, which are especially committed to Development Education, did not focus largely on Ecumenical
Learning. It therefore did not become a relevant, constitutive element of Global
Learning in Austria (interview with J ÄGGLE , ibd.).
Intercultural Learning also remained free of religion. There is a number of reasons why the religious pedagogy should participate in the project of Intercultural Learning
(see J ÄGGLE 1995). The arguments can also be transferred to Global Learning.
Austria, as a world centre for dialogue between the Churches in West and East
20
- not to mention the constant mandate for a dialogue between Christians and Jews, the particular reputation of the Austrian Catholic Church in the Islamic world as well as the profiled commitment of the Churches to foreigners, refugees and asylum seekers
- would offer an excellent base for Interreligious Learning as an indispensable part of
Global Learning. Feelings of cultural superiority, the pressure to assimilate enforced by religious instruction, and the lack of points of contact between the pedagogy for immigrants and the religious education, prevent a stronger participation (see J ÄGGLE
1995, p.12).
On the basis of confessional religious instruction, school could offer an important contribution to Intercultural Learning. In its practice, religious instruction takes on this task too little.
21
The relationship to Islam, especially in urban areas, means a special opportunity and a growing challenge for Interreligious Learning. In the context of
Intercultural Learning it would not mean to understand “Islam”, but to start a dialogue with people who confess to it or are formed by it, in their very orientations in life and their objectives, collective patterns and differences, religious expressions and reservations, sensitivities and fears (see J ÄGGLE 1995, p.19). In Vienna there is a
Working Association of Christian-Muslim Religious Teachers, which offers a forum for dialogue, produces materials and organises study days which open up new possibilities for Interreligious Learning.
20
It is special in Austria that so many Eastern Churches are present. In the Ecumenical Council of the Churches 14 Churches are represented. In 2003 the Ecumenical Council published for the first time, also for the first time in the world, a common social declaration, which also referred to education and development policy.
21
In 2005 there was a specific initiative in the “Week of Religious Instruction“.
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III. Global Learning a. Competencies
Global Learning is understood to contribute to mastering the challenges in education, which result from proceeding globalisation processes, as well as to a better orientation within the Weltgesellschaft (world society) (see A SBRAND / S CHEUNPFLUG
2005a). I want to mention six important competencies:
Competency 1: Seeing global interdependence.
The competency to see complex, global interdependencies, to understand them and reflect on them critically.
Competency 2: Seeing one’s own globality
The competency of the insight into one’s own relations to globality in everyday life.
Competency 3: Assessing values
The competency to assess values and attitudes.
Competency 4: Developing perspectives and visions
The competency to develop a future-oriented approach and visions.
Competency 5: Thinking for action in a global context
The competency to reflect, and develop options for action in a global context as well.
Competency 6: Readiness for communication and participation
The competency to participate in an independent and integrated way in communication and decision-making processes.
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b. Areas of Tensions and challenges
The protagonists of Global Learning are faced with various challenges if they want to contribute to the acquisition of the competencies mentioned above. Do their concrete concepts focus on these competencies enough? I would like to present and reflect on the areas of conflict in which the conceptual questions are placed.
The Factual Dimension: Formation of the Personality in a Global Context?
The diversity and multidimensionality of conceptual approaches have not yet led to a satisfying comprehensive concept of Global Learning in Austria (see G RANDITS 2003,
N ORTH -S OUTH C ENTRE 2006).
22
Neda Forghani-Arani asks for a general redefinition of
Global Learning if it is not to be perceived as an irrelevant subject. She especially calls for a clarification of which competencies ought to be acquired through Global
Learning (conversation with F ORGHANI -A RANI , 21 September 2005).
Some questions are raised in this regard:
Can Global Learning lead to an awareness of one’s own interconnectedness with global issues which exceeds the very momentum of a learning process? Does it contribute to people’s ability to understand themselves as well as their interests better, to understand complex interdependences, and to gain insight into political processes?
Can complex correlations to daily realities in one’s own society be better understood through reflection on conditions elsewhere, i.e. through the relation between a global perspective and the close environment of learners, respectively through the reflection on structures affecting people directly in view of their global context? Can preconditions be achieved so that the individual can better manage his or her own life and participate in society?
How can the dominant linear thought pattern and model of action - that development is manageable be put to an end in order to create room for contradiction, visions, and alternatives? Can Global Learning enable us to question certainty and show new possible dimensions? According to Andreas Novy, "it requires a new paradigm that
22
Marijana Grandits states in her survey on the status quo of Global Learning in Austria that the expression Global Learning was put across the term Development Education (G RANDITS 2003, p.8).
15

looks upon development as a holistic process which entails culture, society, economy, and politics in equal measure" (N OVY 2005b, p.32).
The success of education is measured by the employability of individuals, their flexibility, their problem solving capabilities, their computer literacy, and language skills (see O ECD 2005).
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Which acquisition of competencies can be provided by
Global Learning? How can Global Learning, regarding its definition as an education which preserves differences and has a networking character at the same time, contrast this thought pattern? Is Global Learning suitable as a supplement of this process which should make people fit for globalisation - characterised by the claim to better comprehend the planet’s complexity and to provide the ability to react respectively?
Should and can Global Learning be a political-pedagogical concept, or even a concept for self-help in life? Is Global Learning a pedagogy of world problems, or is it about formation of the personality in the global context (conversation with S EITZ , 27
March 2006)? Werner Wintersteiner pleas for interpreting Global Learning as a work area rather than a pedagogical school (interview with W INTERSTEINER , 19 November
2004). Global Learning should certainly not be declared to be the ultima ratio or justification of pedagogy.
The Regional Dimension: Complexity as a Chance to Learn?
The perception of complex interconnections constitutes a challenge for which the respective problem solving abilities exist at an insufficient level. Therefore, high significance is generally given to education as well as to the learning aptitude of human beings (see S CHEUNPFLUG / S CHRÖCK 2002). Yet, the perceptual capacity of people is limited to their close environment, which is to say to sensually tangible problems. The importance of an orientation towards the close environment is widely acknowledged without controversy nowadays. Still, is it rather a didactic principle in order to reduce complexity factually and pedagogically, or is it the initial point for an understanding of complex structures in which people live and which constitutes a hindrance to changing the world towards more global justice?
23
See O
ECD
: Key competencies. In: http://www.oecd.org/document/17/0,2340, en_2649_34749_2669073_1_1_1_1,00.html
, 20 July 2005.
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The rapid speed in which the conditions of people’s environments are changing, results in a high degree of uncertainties. One consequence is the creation of real or mental walls (through laws, the police or the military, but also through discrimination or hostile feelings), which leads to segregation. There is no longer a reciprocal fertilization with the outer world. Such thinking strengthens the inside view and endangers one’s own identity without giving it room for constructive further development. Global Learning is often associated with the hope that the insight will grow that worldwide justice would be an essential contribution to more general security as well as to one’s own security. Can Global Learning meet these expectations? Can it contribute to a better understanding of the complexity of reality and to the ability to bear uncertainties?
The Social Dimension: A Climate of Cooperation?
"Educational sciences are primarily reflexive sciences which try to clarify the conditions of possibilities as well as the limits of education and training in the modern society" (F ORUM E UROPAHAUS B URGENLAND , 2(2005)8, p.5). Actors in this sector bemoan a lack of theoretical reflection. Can a culture of discourses be developed?
Can NGOs play an innovative role in this regard?
Global Learning is an area "in which many things happen in separation from each other" (Interview with K OGLER , 24 April 2006). Can Global Learning promote a climate of co-operation through its inter- and transdisciplinary character? In the light of competition for advantages in location and funds from third-parties, this is definitely no easy task, but an essential challenge (F ASCHINGEDER / Z AUNER 2005, p. 43). How can the crossing of borders by extending the formal education system work? How can we strengthen processes of informal learning (see F ORSTER 2005, p. 4)?
Finally, the discourse on international standardisations - such as on key competencies at the OECD (see O ECD 2003 and 2006) - has raised the question of whether a holistically interpreted term "Global Learning" can be the basis for an international curriculum of reference.
24
Global Learning could be an attractive offer for education systems, especially if it is about the mediation of competencies in the sense of key qualifications defined by the OECD. However, the national and regional
24
A precondition for that would be to assess the contents of national curricula with regard to their world societal content.
17

political culture in questions of Global Learning as an initial point of reference should not be lost.
The Institutional Dimension: Systemic Conditions as a Stumbling Block or Helpmate?
There are some barriers in the systemic conditions hindering the rapid further development of Global Learning in Austria. Nevertheless, some models and successes within the period of investigation show that they are for the most part not insurmountable. They need to be constantly analysed and reinterpreted in the light of contradictions between claim and performance.
One of these barriers is "the rapid transformation (of education and enlightenment) into a distribution system of products and services" (G ÖTTEL 1998, p.2). The institutions responsible for education submit more and more to a businessmanagement model of "quality management" and "controlling". Frequently occurring inspection measures, far from stimulating debate, diminish the space for cogitation, controversy and the impassioned encounter in learning processes. Methods that are often not critically questioned, such as logical framework assessment, are on the verge of removing from education its sense of its own. There is a risk that a narrowly defined management understanding of the use of education describes education as something that has to produce observable results. People responsible for education programmes are critical of the trend that ensures that they have to spend more and more time on comprehensive planning patterns, monitoring tasks, scrupulous accounting rules, and the acquisition of further third-party funding. Education work, in the sense of reflection, the ability to judge, and mental autonomy, falls behind (see
R UMPF 2005). Konrad Paul Liessmann suspects that behind evaluation schemes and quality inspections there are "phantasies of efficiency, usability, control, top performances, and adaptation (…): All of them signs of a lack of education"
(L IESSMANN 2006, p.II). They neither serve knowledge nor curiosity nor freedom. The managerialisation of education is a special threat to innovative and future-oriented approaches which are characteristic of Global Learning.
The protagonists of Global Learning in Austria are therefore faced with further challenges:
18

Public and private funders would have to secure successful structures as well as to enable a diverse project culture. Will there be a relevant increase in the resources that are, in consequence, required? Will the commitment of a large number of organisations in Austria be supported in order to strengthen and develop Global
Learning, and to integrate the perspective of global solidarity as a necessity in the
Austrian education system?
Global Learning is no concept which will lead to rapid effectiveness. Will the stakeholders be granted the necessary time, patience, and financial resources in order to further develop the respective efforts for quality? Moreover, funders and activists should esteem the field of research and evaluation more (especially the establishment of a culture of self-evaluation). Will the need for quality improvement and evaluation, not from the perspective of managerial control but from the perspective of learning for improvement, be acknowledged? The latter requires the implementation of workshops to qualify colleagues in programmes and projects. Will they be able to clarify these requirements and to raise awareness, respectively?
The challenge is to understand Global Learning as a collaborative project. "It needs allies for the implementation of global perspectives in the field of education and pedagogics, in teachers’ associations, and in school practice"
(S EITZ 1999, p. 28).
25
The elaboration of a national strategy on Global Learning should assess which of these areas for potential improvement are interlinked and which could become strategic priorities in the coming years. More about it soon.
The International Dimension: A Contribution to Coherence?
More than ever before, there is a necessity for international exchange and collaboration in international programmes and projects. Can a coherent and coordinated strategy be developed? The possibilities of co-operation with the new
EU-member states provide a special opportunity in this regard.
Great importance is attached to direct communication and encounters in Global
Learning. How can international educational collaborations and exchanges be
25
Compare Austrian Strategy Group Global Learning
19

organised and led under conditions of socio-economic inequalities and structural differences?
The Political Dimension: Redesigning Politics through Global Learning?
The conceptual assumption that Global Learning can contribute to political action is wide-spread. This leads to some questions:
Given the problems facing the world, how can claims for responsible action be reduced to a realistic dimension which is possible for the individual as well as feasible for society?
26
Is Global Learning so concentrated on socio-political change, that the competencies to critique and to engage in structural analysis are lost? How can organisations acquire knowledge in orientation over and over again, and critically reflect on their own actions (F ASCHINGEDER / N OVY 2003, p. 25)?
How can the high levels of normativity, the "missionary idealism of ethos" (S EITZ
1999, p. 28), in conceptual approaches to Global Learning be overcome? Can the learning process be kept as an independent path which is not instrumentalized by people from outside or those higher up in the hierarchy? Is this possible without the loss of values based on social justice for all people?
Can educational politics be redesigned in order to answer to these questions?
The Pedagogical Dimension: Global Learning as a Recipe Book on Development?
The thoughts mentioned above result in several questions on the didactics of Global
Learning:
How can Global Learning contribute to the articulation of visions as well as to a creative and visionary opening up of alternative thinking and action? One way could be to avoid intentional planning of learning processes towards objectives, and
26
For instance see Ingrid Schwarz for whom the mission statement of participation "calls civil society for participation, it even obliges it to it, and therefore hands over the question of planning the future of the world to the responsibility of individuals, i.e. the acting of individuals" (S
CHWARZ
2000, p.143).
20

instead to give room for reflection on the initial point and to have the courage to engage in uncertain paths.
Heidi Grobbauer stresses the importance of voluntary learning situations.
27
Learning is only possible in freedom. According to Werner Wintersteiner, Global Learning only takes place if there are three factors combined in one concrete case:
Openness for the "Others", their realities, value systems and behaviour patterns.
Thinking about one’s own situation, one’s own behaviour patterns and attitudes.
Insight into global interconnectedness (economy, politics, culture).
(W INTERSTEINER 2004)
Do holistic forms of education support the achievement of these factors? Can the required competencies be acquired or strengthened by a methodology of posing questions, of irritating, of alienating?
28
Does it account for the importance of the dialectic interplay of practice and theory, and therefore for the continuous reflection on action?
Some stakeholders, especially funders, often demand innovations which seem to have become the lifeforce of modern society. Yet, is the pressure to effect change mixed up with innovation? Does it lead to the reinvention of the wheel? Is the process sustainable? Do we succeed in interlocking existent wheels? Still, should we not also encourage the reliable repetition of educational measures because educational processes need stability - besides new impulses?
The overwhelming number of programmes and projects on Global Learning address young people in particular. Does this fact point to the hope that the following generations will improve the world or that we even delegate the improvement of the world to them? Or is it a result of obligatory school attendance which leads to a simple access to young people? Is the knowledge of organisations outside school
27
She points to an educational summer week for volunteers in which various target groups learned globally with the help of diverse methods (conversation with G ROBBAUER , 28 March 2006).
28
See: "Children like to learn if they experience their competencies in doing so, and are proud of the result" (SPIEL: Der Standard, 6 September 2006).
21

and the existential orientation of young people good enough? (See S PANNRING 2004,
O GRIS 1997). Are there personal contacts with young people? Are there collaborations with youth organisations? Are the youngsters addressed, regarding their interests and experiences; are they met emotionally? Are they given the possibility to develop their own initiatives? Can they experience moments of success?
29
Is the pedagogical perspective generally reflected? If it is true that knowledge and information can only be accepted and integrated if the main efforts for understanding and recognition are made by the people concerned themselves, and if it can be put in a meaningful context in their own life realities: Are the feelings as well as social and cultural needs of the pupils involved, or is the learning process mainly limited to cognitive competencies? Are the biographical experiences of all people involved integrated into the thinking and learning processes? It cannot be expected that learners suddenly adopt independence and a decision-making ability at the end of learning processes whose objectives and content are determined from outside.
Sometimes Global Learning is accused of being a pedagogical concept of the white middle-classes from the northwest of the globe. Two remarks are contained in this accusation: First, the concepts and projects of Global Learning are mainly characterised by an approach of the educated middle-classes. The question is whether the concentration on the middle-classes can be overcome, whether new milieus can be addressed. In other words, can an interest in discovering commonness be aroused through differences? This would mean the challenge of an alternative form of communication. Concerning the second critique contained in the accusation, many involved would argue strenuously that Global Learning is not a neo-colonial Western concept. They certainly do not wish to extend a certain image of education and knowledge of a northern society around the globe. Nevertheless, there is a real risk that globalisation "swallows" Global Learning, that it is replaced by a differently defined Global Learning as "the same education for all worldwide".
29
In order to better address the target group of young people, Südwind Agency Vienna has entrusted the youth researcher Reingard Spannring to assess the political interests of young people and to develop guidelines how to make them interested in topics on development and environment
(see S PANNRING 2004). She points to international data which show that political participation among youngsters does not differ fundamentally from the participation of adults. Still, they know less about concrete possibilities of participation and experience their environment as not open minded enough.
22

Global Learning is not developed in isolation from other conceptions in which global issues play an integral part. I want to enumerate four current subject areas and present them with regard to the importance of their perspectives.
There are interesting challenges in and through some of the neighbouring pedagogies, such as Education in the World Society, Education for Sustainable
Development, Intercultural Learning or Civic Education. It would stretch my time beyond limits to deal with them in detail. However, they should not be seen as rivals
(although they often are in the chase for funding), but as allies.
IV. Austrian Strategy on
The Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Arts and Culture (MoE) mandated the
Austrian Strategy Group Global Learning with the development of an Austrian strategy for Global Learning. The first part of the process took two years and involved experts and various interest groups. The overarching aim of the Strategy is the broader integration of Global Learning in the Austrian education system.
The Strategy Group was established in 2003. Its members are experts from various fields in the Austria education system with a long-standing record in Global Learning.
The group aims to strengthen Global Learning in Austria qualitatively and structurally
– through measures taken throughout the education system. Among its members are representatives of the MoE, of ADA (the Austrian Development Agency), of NGOs, along with members from from school pratice and from universities. The Strategy
Group is a co-ordinating group, which discusses Global Learning programmes, projects and initiatives in Austria and contributes to networking in this area.
The Strategy Group follows the international debate in the field of Global Education and Learning and reflects on its relevance for Austria.
30
The Development of the Austrian Strategy on Global Learning
The development of an Austrian strategy for Global Learning is the result of a multiannual process.
It is informed by the European discourse and embedded in the
European strategy for the strengthening of Global Education and Learning in
30
See Annex: Mission Statement of the Strategy Group Global Learning
23

European countries, as formulated in the Maastricht Declaration (2002). During the development of the Austrian strategy, experiences of similar processes in Finland and Ireland were taken on board.
From 2005 to 2006 a Peer Review of Global Education in Austria was carried out. An international delegation of the North-South Centre of the Council of Europe and
GENE (Global Education Network Europe) published a report on the situation of
Global Learning in Austria.
31
The report was based on an analysis of documents and interviews with representatives of educational institutions and stakeholders in Global
Learning. One of the recommendations was to develop an Austrian strategy for
Global Learning.
Aims of a strategy for the integration of Global Learning within in the Austrian education system
The Strategy for Global Learning aims to make Global Learning widely recognised within the Austrian education landscape and to strengthen it. This will be achieved as follows:

Strengthening of the structures of Global Learning in the Austrian formal education system, especially in the areas in-service training of teachers, teacher training, school development, curriculum development, external Global
Learning programmes and educational materials for schools and pre-school/ kindergarden pedagogy.
 Widening academic lecturing and research in Global Learning as well as promoting a process of reflection on theory and practice of Global Learning; especially by offering a wider range of courses and lectures on Global
Learning at Austrian universities.
 Carrying out research projects, promoting publications on Global Learning.
 Developing further the concept of Global Learning.
 Strengthening Global Learning in the non-formal education sector, esp. in adult education and extra-curricular youth-work.
 Establishing a commitment to Global Learning with various actors and stakeholders in society.
31
Similar reviews have so far been carried out in Cyprus, The Netherlands, Finland, The Czech
Republic, Norway and Poland (currently underway).
24

The process of the strategy development 32
These areas involve differing frameworks and pre-conditions for Global Learning.The
participatory nature of the process of strategy development requires sufficient time.
The overall timescale of the process was therefore set for two to three years. In the first phase the Strategy Group focused on the first of four chosen priority areas 33 – the formal education sector. The group then analysed the framework conditions for
Global Learning in the formal education system and then formulated recommendations for the strengthening of Global Learning in this area.
The formulation of strategies in relation to the other three areas of priority focus: for adult education; for extra-curricular children’s and youth work; and for the third level sector and research takes place in a second phase starting in autumn 2009.
Strategy Global Learning
In order to achieve a sustainable integration of Global Learning within the formal education system in Austria, it was agreed that the strategy for Global Learning must address the following areas, for each of which targets were formulated and measures regarding how to reach these targets were recommended. Most recommendations are aimed at decision makers in the education system. Many measures complement those of other strategy areas (e.g. in-service training of teachers coalesces with research).
a. To integrate Global Learning in the in-service training of teachers.
34
32
The Strategy Group on Global Learning planned the process according to the following criteria:
 Transparency: Through broad information various actors are informed at the beginning of the process and invited to participate.
 Participation: In workshops and roundtables interest- and expert-groups are integrated in the formulation of the strategy.
 Reflection: The Strategy Group Global Learning accompanies the process and its results.
 Documentation: The process of the strategy development is documented.
33
Formal education system, Adult education, Extra-curricular youth- and children’s work, Third level sector and research
34
The following measures are recommended:
 Global Learning modules should be implemented in the curricula of universities and pedagogical colleges; for a start there should be a pilot test at some of them.
 In the field of subject-centred didactics an interdisciplinary seminar should be offered.
 Teacher-trainers responsible for in-service training should be supported to enrich their lectures with Global Learning issues and methods. For their support “Train the Trainer“modules should be developed and implemented.
25

b. To integrate Global Learning in teacher training.
35 c. To raise consciousness for Global Learning in the area of school policy and school administration.
36 d. More schools integrate Global Learning in their school development processes
(mission statements and school focuses).
37 e. Existing programmes and materials in Global Learning are distributed and enlarged.
38
35
 Experts from the theory and practice of Global Learning (e.g. from NGOs) should find broader acceptance in the in-service training at universities and pedagogical colleges.
The following measures are recommended:
 The provision of Global Learning at pedagogical colleges should be enlarged and structurally strengthened (e.g. definition of minimum quantity).
 Global Learning courses (for all school types and age levels) should be promoted explicitly.
 Global Learning modules should be integrated in existing courses e.g. for Civic Eduaction or
Intercultural Learning.
 More Global Learning seminars should be offered - both with reference to subject methodological training (e.g. Geography, History, Languages) and with a cross-cutting approach.
 Global Learning should be especially recommended in in-serice training at schools.
 Trainers in teacher training should be supported to enrich their lectures in content and method according to the concept of Global Learning.
 An exhibition introducing the concept of Global Learning (in theory and practice) should be designed and shown at each pedagogical college.
36
The following measures are recommended:
 There should be targeted communication work about Global Learning for each of the groups mentioned above.
 International initiatives with reference to Global Learning (e.g. Decade on ESD, Global
Education Week, thematic focus initiatives), which contribute to greater popularity of Global
Learning, should continue to happen.
37
The following measures are recommended:
 A thematic and procedural framework plan concerning school development and Global
Learning should be worked out.
 Heads of schools and co-ordinators of school-management should be informed of the possibilities available to consider Global Learning in the frame of school development.
 Schools, which already have Global Learning in their vision or have a school focus on it, should be enlisted and invited for an exchange.
38
The following measures are recommended:
 Quality criteria for Global Learning programmes and materials should be developed (in the frame of the Strategy Group).
38
 An approved list of recommended Global Learning offers and materials should be published annually and disseminated to all schools.
 The existing repertoire of programmes and materials should be constantly enlarged in the following ways: o Brief thematic programmes for the new Middle Schools o More subject-oriented programmes (e.g. Geography, History. Languages)
26

f. Global Learning is made visible in the subject curricula.
39
Last but not least: g. Global Learning is integrated into the pre-school/ kindergarden curricula.
40
The sector of pre-school education grows more important in all pedagogical debates.
Global Learning offers many links to the lives of children and thus can enrich the spectrum of materials in kindergardens.
V. Summary
What is Global Learning?
As an educational concept Global Learning claims to respond to the growing complexity and to the movement towards a Weltgesellschaft (“global society“) in a pedagogically adequate way.
An essential task of education today is to enable people, young and old, to understand these complex processes of development and also to see their own possibilities for societal participation and shaping a Weltgesellschaft.
By enabling learners to see and understand processes which are globally interdependent, by enabling them to pass personal judgement and to acknowledge the possibilities for
39
40
 Global Learning programmes and materials should promote cross-subject and inter-subjcet oriented teaching.
 The existing external specialist libraries and advice centres for Global Learning should be strengthened.
 Existing internal school materials (school books and extra materials for subjects) should be revised to strengthen/ include a Global Learning perspective. Members of schoolbook commissions could be advised concerning Global Learning.
The following measures are recommended:
 A comprehensive commentary on the curricula (concerning their links with Global Learning) should be written by Global Learning experts.
 Global Learning should find access into the development of curricula. There are some concrete areas for it: General Educational Aims (Introduction of Curricula), Areas of Education
(Global Learning could be added as a new element), Subject Curricula and Education
Standards.
The following measures are recommended:
 Global Learning should be integrated into the training of kindergarden/ pre-school educators.

Global Learning materials for kindergardens should be developed and made accessible.
27

action as well as through the development and reflection of values and attitudes
Global Learning is an indispensable contribution to a contemporary general education.
Thematic dimensions of Global Learning
Especially rooted in Development Education, Global Learning has been developed as a pedagogical concept since the beginning of the 1990s, which at its outset takes a look at the world as a whole. The global political, economic, social, ecological and cultural interdependences require us to see the world as a whole and to adjust teaching and learning accordingly.
The content of Global Learning is based on the concept of “One World“, while acknowledging diversity, disparities and differences. The selection and formation of content issues are derived from that. Global Learning curricula address the key issues of today, above all the economic and social disparities in the world, the structural violence against people and peoples, the ecological threats. Causes are analysed, probable consequences are explored and possibilities for intervention are considered.
In principle, almost every curriculum content in education can be understood in a global context and can thus become a priority in Global Learning. Therefore, a tight canon of topics makes little sense. In Global Learning, issues are dealt with from differing perspectives and viewpoints led by differing interests are made visible.
Didactical dimensions of Global Learning
From the beginning the question how to arrange educational processes has played a vital role in the development of Global Learning. Global Learning is directed at participation of the learners. The most important corner stones are:
 Educational processes should start with the living experience of learners.
Educational processes must be relevant to learners’ needs and pertinent to their lives. Programmes must therefore be conceived and planned according to the interests and experiences of learners.
 The experiences of the learners should be moved into the centre of education processes. Global Learning should allow for self-reflection, and enable
28

learners to examine their own values, opinions, prejudices and stereotypes. It should heighten learners’ understanding of prevailing tensions, such as heigthened uncertainities, contraditcions, lack of orientation and should foster the capabilitites necessary for learners to deal with these tensions.
 The complexity of issues requires methods, which adequately depict the topics. The interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary 41 treatment of issues is therefore an appropriate approach in Global Learning.
 Global Learning requires a variety of methods and opens up forms of changes of perspectives for the learners.

Global Learning seeks to link learning on a cognitive, affective and social level.
Global Learning in a network
In the context of the complexity of the subject, Global Learning requires the opening up of issues in a multi-perspective way, using inter- and transdisciplinary approaches.
Global Learning shows many links to other pedagogical fields such as Peace and
Human Rights Education, Civic Education, Intercultural and Interreligious Learning,
Global Environment Education and Development Education as well as Education for
Sustainable Development. These links are, on the one hand, defined by their historical context (roots of Global Learning) and development (already at the beginning of the 1990s Development Education and Global Learning had formed a close relationship between development and environment issues), on the other hand through aims, objectives, content and methodologies. As far as forms of learning and methodological and didactical principles are concerned there is a broad common basis among the different pedagogical areas and there is a common orientation with progressive educational movements and with critical pedagogical concepts and approaches. In the central issues there exist numerous cross-overs between the single areas.
The basic difference lies in the contextual extension through Global Learning, where all issues are put into a global perspective. Therefore Global Learning can be seen, for example in Civic Education in a global context; or when those engaged in
41
Intersiciplinarity is understood as the approach of global issues by linking the single disciplines.
Transdisciplinarity is understood as the attempt to approach global issues beyond the limits of single disciplines and thus to reach new interlinked awareness as well as the attempt to combine theoretical and practical knowledge.
29

Intercultural Learning or Environment Education, acknowledge that they start from local (spatially or socially) references, and move into global connections.
In such an understanding Global Learning is a broad network with other pedagogical areas. Global Learning is not meant to dominate or to expel these other areas. The complex challenges and interdependences in global developments, but also the problems that have to be tackled, require broad and varied access points and mutual acknowledegement and respect.
Globality as a perspective
Numerous educational programmes and practices of Global Learning are set within the tension between political and pedagogical positions. This tension can be characterised as a continuum of understandings: ranging from an understanding that education must include the task of striving for a better world, to an understanding of education as something that is necessarily open-ended, therefore not amenable to a pre-determined result.
The German-speaking discourse about the conceptual direction of Global Learning is particularly marked by a focus on the way in which normative aims in education are dealt with. The Strategy Group has taken on this debate in the expert workshops and has characterised this as a distinction between action-oriented and evolution-/ systemic-oriented approaches to theories of Global Learning. The action-oriented approach puts the vision of a sustainable future on the basis of social justice at the centre. As a priority it aims at a competency of action in solidarity. Systemic models, on the other hand, (based on evolution theory) place a concern for the growth of complexity and progress towards a Weltgesellschaft at the centre. The priority is to educate for thinking and judging in interconnected situations.
The strategy Global Learning situates itself mainly within the second approach. It starts from the assumption that education can prepare learners to deal with complexity and life in a Weltgesellschaft by taking into account how to deal with uncertainty, not-knowing and the risk of lack of orientation. In close connection with it
Global Learning follows a pedagogical understanding of learning processes, which are self-organised and individual and which are initiated by learning situations in
30

one’s own environment, but not determined through them.
42
Thus Global Learning should promote the understanding, critical reflection of global developments and a differentiated ability to judgement as well as to contribute to an independent and creative opening up of alternative possibilities of interpretation, communication and action. Among the topics of Global Learning programmes, processes and materials are differing concepts of development, of power and lack of power, of global justice, of inclusion and exclusion of individuals as well as of groups, also of democracy and development in a national and global context.
The Strategy Group Global Learning regards the further development and the implementation of this approach as an important challenge for theory development in
Global Learning as well as for dialogue with the central stakeholders of Global
Learning in Austria like e.g. the NGOs.
Competencies and acquisition of competencies in Global Learning
The question of the development of competencies in Global Learning is a central and controversial issue. There is broad agreement that the aim of contemporary education is not only the acquisition of professional knowledge, but that education is about developing complex abilities. The competencies, which should be promoted through Global Learning, can generally speaking be seen as “reflected and selfreflexive political thinking and acting“, when at the same time the global context is considered.
43 The differentiation of competencies for Global Learning still has to be worked out.
The debate about competencies in Global Learning is young and requires theoretical foundation through research. The debate regarding which competencies are central in Global Learning is closely linked to the general direction of Global Learning as referred to above. It also follows the debate about competencies in neighbouring pedagogical fields, e.g. Civic Education or Education for Sustainable Development, where the debate is also controversial and unfinished.
42
See Scheunpflug, Annette: Die konzeptionelle Weiterentwicklung des Globalen Lernens. In. VENRO
(ed.): Jahrbuch Globales Lernen. Bonn 2007.
43
See Krammer, Reinhard: Kompetenzen durch Politische Bildung. In: Informationen zur politischen
Bildung (29) 2008, p.5.
31

Quality criteria for Global Learning
The debate about quality development and quality criteria increasingly also takes place e.g. in the United Kingdom, in Finland, in Germany and Switzerland, so that it will be possible to bring together past experiences and any further development and to discuss it elsewhere.
HOPE. Indeed, we care
Little for this torchlight scene;
We would wander our own ways
On the sunny summer days,
Freely through the meadows green,
Single or companioned, choosing
To be active or reposing.
Lacking nothing, free of care,
All we seek is granted there;
Everyone a welcome guest,
We may enter where we please,
Seeking happiness with ease,
Sure of finding what is best.
JOHANN WOLFGANG GOETHE: Faust II, verses 5428-5440
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Note on the Author
Born in Vienna in 1950.
He graduated from Vienna University (English, History and Pedagogy). After one year as assistant teacher in Brighton (UK), he taught at a Viennese grammar school until 1986, interrupted by working stays in Algeria (school project) and Central America. From 1983 education officer at ÖIE (Austrian
Information Service for Development. Policy), from 1986 director, from 1989 to
1995 also coordinator of the NGO-Association for Development Assistance
(AGEZ). From 1987 to 1995 member of the Advisory Committee for
Development Assistance of the Austrian Government.
In 1991 tutorship at European North-South Centre in Lisbon, later Global
Education programme advisor for the Centre and founding member of the
Global Education Network Europe (GENE), since 2005 Chair of GENE.
From 1993 to 1996 president of Fairtrade (fair trade labelling organisation), in
1994 UN election-observer in South Africa, from 1997 various international evaluation studies.
From 1995 to 2004 director of KommEnt (Society for Communication and
Development), since 2004 director Development Communication and
Education at ADA (Austrian Development Agency).
Since 2003 chair of Austrian Strategy Group Global Education, since 2006 chair of UNESCO Committee Education for Sustainable Development.
2004-2007 PhD on Global Learning in Austria (University Erlangen-
Nuremberg), since 2007 lecturer at Vienna University (International
Development).
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